Bart Swaelens

Bart Swaelens is co-founder and board member of artiq and is based in Putte. Since January 2024 he has been an investment manager at VITO, where he was head of tech transfer and venture development from July 2017 to March 2024 and venture development manager from December 2013 to June 2017. He has served as a board director of QAELUM since September 2013, and he co-founded ArtiQ, holding a board seat there from February 2019 to February 2024. Between September 2014 and September 2015 he was co-founder and general manager of MedTech Flanders.

Swaelens spent more than two decades at Materialise, joining as a project manager in 1992, managing the software and medical division from 1996 to 2004, and serving as a director and member of the executive committee from 2004 to 2006. He was CEO of Materialise Dental Group from 2006 to 2013 and general manager of Materialise Dental, a division of Dentsply, from 2011 to 2013.

He studied mechanical engineering at KU Leuven, graduating with a Master of Science in 1991, and continued there as a PhD researcher until 1992. He later completed an entrepreneurial bootcamp at Vlerick Business School in 2014 and a board effectiveness programme at Guberna, the institute for directors, in 2019 and 2020.